


Time.

by Monochrome_girl (Skarita)



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, Finding things in common, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2016-09-13
Packaged: 2018-08-14 22:39:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8031700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skarita/pseuds/Monochrome_girl
Summary: Sometimes you just want to find something familiar. Something time left behind, alongside you.





	Time.

**Author's Note:**

> This is really just a drabble I've been turning over in my head for weeks. Good god has it been a long time since I've written fan-fiction. Hopefully it gets some thoughts going, though.

Mei felt rude for thinking it, but the natural history museum wasn’t a place she’d really expected to see Lena Oxton, staring up at a replica of a dinosaur that managed to be twice as tall as she was but with just as much leg. She might have missed her- after all, when not on the job Lena’s outfit tended to consist of jeans and an aviator jacket large enough to hide her chronal accelerator, but hair of that height was pretty difficult to miss. She watched as Tracer took a wander down the corridor, feet pattering across the stone floor, intermingled with tourists more interested in the fossils than the hero that walked among them. 

Maybe that was why she was here- a place where she wasn’t quite the attraction she would be on the streets. 

Tracer turned. Mei waved. 

“Hi! I didn’t expect to see you here.” 

Tracer looked just as surprised to see her- though perhaps a little less after a moment of thought. Mei’s reputation as a scientist did precede her, after all. Her expression relaxed into a warm smile as she wandered over, hands in pockets.

“Having a day off to check out the sights?”

Mei returned the smile. “I know there are other museums close by, but I have to admit, this one’s my favourite. What brings you here?” 

“Oh you know, it’s just… Familiar.” Tracer looked around “I like it here. It doesn’t change all that much.” She gestured to the room around them, the high ceiling, the skeletons. “Pretty sure these have been around for a century. Guess we’re lucky it’s all survived so long. Which way were y’heading? That is, if you don’t mind me tagging along.” 

“Oh, sure!” Mei settled into step, heading along the rows, Tracer following beside her. “I have been here a few times too” she admitted, pausing to check out a taxidermy bird in a glass case. “I like how you put it. It’s familiar.”

“Yeah.” There was a relaxed tone in her voice Mei hadn’t really heard before. 

They wandered in comfortable silence for a while, making their way through areas built well before the 21st century, hallways made of stone. Tracer would occasionally stop in front of something, only half-reading the description plaque- wandering a little closer to the display, pausing, then tugging at the collar of her jacket. It must have been uncomfortable, having to wear so much excess bulk when she went out. Less snug than a ski jacket, at least. 

“Hey, Lena?”

“What’s up, love?” She turned away from the exhibit for a moment to look down at Mei. 

“How often do you actually come here?” It was a question that had been on her mind for the last few exhibits, and it caused a chuckle. 

“I don’t really keep track, but I keep finding myself back here. I used to come here when I was a little kid, you know? Dinosaurs were so awesome when I was six.” 

“Dinosaurs are awesome” Mei agreed. “Maybe if I didn’t find climatology so interesting, I would have become a paleontologist instead.” 

“Heh. Maybe if I didn’t have a jet-plane phase after…”

There was more to the conversation. They both knew it. 

“How’s about we find the café?” 

___

Once seated (and sated with cake and tea- Mei wouldn’t trust English coffee to save her life), they started their conversation again. 

“I was wondering why you were here, when I came in. I guess I kind of figured out, after a while.” 

Tracer paused, midway through a mouthful of chocolate cake, drawing the fork slowly from her mouth and putting it down. 

“I figured you might,” she replied, after swallowing. “I like that it hasn’t changed. Everything else did. When I finally got back, I mean.” Her smile came out wonky. “I guess you know how it feels now.”

“I think I do.” Things that hadn’t changed when she came out of cryostasis were a rarity. She’d come into a world that had decided not to pause conveniently while she was frozen. “When I came back it was… Well, Overwatch was gone. Everyone was gone.” After confronting the truth about it so often, the misery in her head had been replaced with something of a hollow acceptance. “I’m doing my best to catch up. Winston gave me a journal, and everything. Hopefully it’s not too boring.”

“I’d like to read that. I always thought your research was cool.” 

Mei chuckled. The pun was terrible. Tracer’s hand had reached across the table, and stopped before making contact with her fingers. Mei bridged the gap, placing her palm over Tracer’s knuckles. Her hand was warm. 

“If I remember it right, you were lost in the slipstream for nearly a year, weren’t you? You were so brave when you came back.” She gave her hand a squeeze. “You were a really good agent. It’s a shame we didn’t get to talk more before I left for Antarctica.” 

It was Tracer’s turn to chuckle, embarrassed. “Thanks for saying, but I was a kid. I wasn’t brave, not really. I was just really chuffed to not be a ghost anymore.”

“I guess we have that in common. Everyone keeps telling me…” Beneath her palm, Tracer’s hand shifted, grasped hers gently, squeezed back. Empathy. 

“You’re back now.”

“We’re back now.” Mei released her hand, reached for her cup of tea and sipped. Tracer withdrew her hand and went back to her cake- slicing bits of it off with her fork, but not eating it. Something else was still on her mind. “What’s up?” 

Tracer’s cheeks coloured. Combined with the freckles, it made her look about as young as Mei remembered her. The woman had turned 26 without her being there. A lot of things like this were occurring to her today. 

“Well, you know, we’re here, that’s one thing. But I can show you other stuff that helps, if you like. We could hang out? Only if you’re keen, though.” 

“More museums?”

“If you want. There’s a lot around, full of old stuff that stays the same.”

“I’d like that, Lena.”

“Cool.”

“Heh. Yeah. Cool.”


End file.
